Small Business Highlight: Consumer Brands

Time to Run Payroll
15 Minutes

Favorite Feature
Employee Self-Service

Location
New Port Beach, CA

# of Employees
18

Industry
Technology Marketing

Not Your Typical Tech Start-Up

When it comes to tech startups, everyone always imagines the Silicon Valley entrepreneurs, but Consumer Brands brought a new feeling to the industry - a scrappy feeling that bucks traditional mass-market advertising. How so? With a focus and deep understanding of their customers pains and needs, Consumer Brands acquires or creates proprietary internet brands such as a variety of websites from healthcare (anxiety.org) to consumer products (inmyarea.com) that gives their consumers the information they need.

Founded in 2011 by a team that had worked together in a prior company, they knew they had a passion towards developing and operating websites that provide consumers resources and solutions for their everyday questions and concerns. One example of their brand breath is the website inmyarea.com. Bill Topaz, a Consumer Brands team member who handles the financial and back-office solutions, explains that the website is a comparison-shopping site that allows consumers to search for various home services from numerous local vendors and quickly pinpoint the best-priced option. Consumers can do this without having to call multiple vendors for quotes and from the comfort of their own home.

“We have very smart and committed people here and we all have the same passion to provide people with the websites they need on the consumer side and on the healthcare side,” Bill mentioned. “We are doing a lot of unique things developing and curating these websites, not only with the goal of providing healthcare information over a handful of topics, but to helping consumers, like military members, who have been transferred find the best prices on high speed internet or cable.”

Keeping It All Online

When the Consumer Brands’ controller left the company and Bill Topaz took over handling those responsibilities, he knew that they would need a change of back office if they hoped to have a provider that could support the growth Consumer Brands expected in the coming year. After already experiencing success with their customers and achieving their first outside investments by providing top resources and support, Bill knew he wanted a payroll provider that matched the level of service and technology that Consumer Brands provided to their own customers. “Previously, we were with a competitor and on the first or second day, I knew we needed to make a change,” Bill said.

“I had so many frustrations with this company and their lack of follow-up that we all were losing time and money to a company that didn’t care about our payroll or employees.”

After making it through the first quarter, Bill asked their accountant who they should consider moving their payroll and HR tasks to. The recommendation was undoubtedly BenefitMall. Bill reached out to one of the reps at BenefitMall and has been both happily surprised and relieved by the service and follow-up he has received from the rep and BenefitMall since the switching process began.

“We went from a complicated payroll system trying to generate reports for hours to a highly customized platform that allows for extensive reporting in no time and employee self-service features that our employees love.” Bill stated.

“The money difference between payroll providers was not paramount. It is about the accessibility for our employees to use the online portal to allow them to do more for themselves, the simplicity and ease of use of the BenefitMall system, and on the accounting side it is the personal touch that we value,” he said. “We prefer that BenefitMall be there as our co-pilot as we keep our eyes focused on growing our company.”

BenefitMall Online Solutions at Your Fingertips

At BenefitMall we believe in pairing top-notch technology with the highest quality of customer service and industry expertise. It is in the level of service and relationships that businesses build with BenefitMall that in turn allows them to worry less over their payroll and HR administrative tasks, but shift their focus back to growing their business. Instead of sitting on the phone trying to reach someone to discuss your payroll, our online payroll and HR solutions give businesses an extensive online portal at your fingertips for you and your employees. Big or small, learn how BenefitMall can give you the specialized service your business deserves today.